Recorded at Earth Analogue Studio, engineered and mixed by Sanford Parker, mastered by Vlado Meller, and issued through Federal Prisoner (co‑founded by Jesse Draxler and Greg Puciato), “Megamantra” arrives as the third full‑length from industrial metal outfit Black Magnet.
Formerly the solo project of James Hammontree, the group has expanded into a quartet after two releases on 20 Buck Spin and touring alongside 3Teeth, Code Orange, and Author & Punisher.
“Megamantra” executes a scorched, pressure-locked exorcism of American industrial metal as it grinds into flesh. Built from the corroded bones of Godflesh, the self-hate pulse of Nine Inch Nails, and the narcotic haze of Alice in Chains. BLACK MAGNET moves like machine parts shuddering under the strain of memory.
Pummeling, synthetic, infected with punk grit and hard-coded loops, it’s a record built to overload. Jagged riffs, scorched synths, and manifestos in reverb and volume.
Across the record Hammontree’s commentary ties the tracks together around total self‑possession, rejection of imposed identities, destruction of obsolete selves, and a brutal loop of death–rebirth where inner power replaces external validation.
Endless
“Endless” is about self-sovereignty at any cost — shedding weakness, rejecting pity, and forging power from within. It’s a declaration of war on everything that tries to break you, a vow to stand unyielding in your own skin. Endless is the sound of burning your weakness alive — no mercy, no retreat, just raw will carving its own future. It’s total self-possession; nobody gets to define me but me, and there’s no forgiveness for anything that stands in my way. I wrote it as an anthem for feeling unstoppable, but with a dark edge — the understanding that healing sometimes demands cold, ruthless clarity. It’s power born through self-reliance, and the line ‘My sense of self will dominate’ stands as the mission statement for the whole record.
Better Than Love
This track strips away illusions of love and identity to reveal raw, untamed self-power — fierce, solitary, and unstoppable. ‘Better Than Love’ is about replacing what we think we need — connection, approval — with a primal survival instinct. It’s about reclaiming every piece of yourself you once gave away. There’s this deep contradiction in it: craving more life while dreaming about death — that push and pull fuels everything, turning self-destruction into the fire that keeps me alive. The title says it all — what I bring to the world now is better than love. It’s power. It’s truth. It’s the ability to stand alone without breaking.
Spitting Glass
“Spitting Glass” captures the violent struggle of trying to reinvent yourself when you feel trapped inside your own skin. It’s that brutal moment when every thought feels like a cut back at you. The song is me facing down the parts of myself I need to kill off — old patterns, old identities — in order to become something more savage and honest. At its core, it’s about self-exorcism through aggression, embodied in the line ‘I live to destroy my past.
Coming Back Again
“Coming Back Again” is about rebirth through questioning — asking if what we call life is really living, or if death is just another doorway. It’s a mantra for cycles, the idea that everything ends from within but also begins there. You can’t truly kill something wired into your core; no matter how far you run, you’re pulled back to your own beginning. There’s a spiritual tension in the question ‘Is it life or death?’—and the answer is both. It’s the little death, the ego death, the cycle that resets you. The line ‘Infinity embodies me’ is my claim to that part of myself that never dies, no matter what breaks in the physical world. I like the image of ‘angel wings on magazines’ because it’s both sacred and disposable — that contradiction sums up the whole song.
Null + Void
“Null & Void” is pure revolt — it’s me rejecting anything or anyone trying to tell me who I’m supposed to be, whether it’s gods, idols, or empty systems. There’s a line about praying to a ‘product placement deity’ — that’s me calling out how belief and identity get sold back to us as marketing, and I want no part of it. This one’s about scorched-earth freedom — I’m not interested in serving anything that wants me on my knees. If there’s a god in this song, he’s on fire with the rest of them. It’s burning it all down: false idols, false histories, anyone who profits off our obedience. ‘God is losing and the sky is bruising’ — that’s the feeling, the end of the old script. When I say ‘I take no command from a force fed hand,’ that’s my line in the sand — no more swallowing what we’re sold, no more apologies for tearing it all down. It’s an effigy for anyone who profits from control — a reminder that the void I hold inside is mine alone, and no decree can touch it.
Night Tripping
“Night Tripping” is about that haunted feeling when you can’t tell if you’re dreaming or buried alive in your own mind. It’s paranoia, repetition, and self-doubt looping just beneath the surface. The song’s imagery — frozen soil, black blood, shattered wings — is me wrestling with the parts of myself that rot but never really die. It’s about seeing through the illusions and realizing there’s nowhere to hide. The line ‘Soon there will be nothing but an empty cage’ is what keeps me up at night — that fear that after all the searching and all the running, there’s nothing left but yourself, and even that feels hollow.
Birth
“Birth” is about the struggle with the body and mind — being trapped in flesh that fights against you, caught in cycles you want to break but feel chained to. The song digs into that tension between the instinctual, reptilian parts of us and the desire to rise above — to transcend the physical decay and mental patterns that weigh us down. There’s a visceral image of decay and transformation here — turning into ‘holy ghosts’ means shedding the physical and mental rot, becoming something beyond the self. There’s this dark spirituality in it too — becoming ‘holy ghosts’ is both a surrender and a liberation, a way to lose the old self and find something purer. The line ‘Destroy the path that you take the most’ is a call to break the habits and familiar roads that lead to self-destruction. And ‘Ball up your fist and blow a kiss’ is that moment of defiance and acceptance — a bittersweet goodbye to the shell that’s been both prison and identity.
Smokeskreen
“Smokeskreen” is about becoming untouchable — like turning to stone to protect yourself from a world that’s always trying to break you down. The song denies the material world and focuses on the internal — where time fades, identity becomes fluid, and you exist beyond the physical. Words like ‘Dominate, Consecrate, Meditate’ are a mantra for reclaiming power through stillness and presence — finding strength in what’s unseen, hidden, and unbreakable.
